The Course of Empire
by Nokomiss
Summary: As the world goes down in flames, Narcissa Malfoy tries to hold on to everything she once thought was dear. Complete.
1. Part One: The Savage State

The Course of Empire

AN: Thanks to Rainpuddle for beta reading! This story was influenced by and has some scenes based on _Gone with the Wind _by Margaret Mitchell. Story title/chapter titles come from a series of paintings by Thomas Cole.

Part One: The Savage State

* * *

"Betcha can't catch me, Sirius!" laughs Regulus, running underneath sun-dappled trees. The scene was memory bright and sunny green, and five children played gaily, for once throwing aside the politics of childhood and forsaking issues of age and gender to have one uninterrupted afternoon of childhood innocence.

Sirius runs at his brother, moving as if he were underwater as Andromeda runs up, grabbing his arm and pulling him in the opposite direction. Bellatrix catches up with Regulus, and pulls him to the ground, laughing. Narcissa does not join the fray, instead only smiles prettily as she watches her family battle playfully.

Parents sit by, talking politely and sometimes teasing and torturing one another in the million tiny ways family members devise over a lifetime. Years-past mistakes are brought up, flaws discussed and choices mocked, but all with the undercurrent of love and loyalty that only family can muster.

Glasses filled with lemonade were handed out. The children delightfully compare the way the charmed ice fish swim and splash around, forgoing the trained solemnity and elegance that their parents have ingrained into them in favor of pure childish delight. Their parents do not fret over grass tangled in long locks of hair or scrapes marring perfect skin. This a day built for memory.

* * *

Narcissa Black knew herself to be an ice-wrought beauty in a family of exotic, passionate witches and wizards. From the time she was very young, she knew that she was slightly different from her sisters, that she had an entirely different set of motivations and aspirations.

Bellatrix wanted to change the world with one fell swoop. Andromeda wanted to change their family with one decisive move. Narcissa wanted to marry into another powerful family, and use the combined influence of the Blacks and whomever she married to try to make society into the place she wanted to raise her children.

She realized her goal was a bit lofty for a teenaged witch with an average number of OWLs and who would, as her professors insisted, probably only earn a passable number of NEWTs. But she had seen her family's power, had talked to the old portraits and knew that what she wanted was not impossible, but easily within her grasp.

For now, though, she settled for enjoying the dinner parties and gatherings of the elite, while doing her best to aid the war that had been brewing for years.

Narcissa knew there would be fortunes to be made and careers entrenched in the outcome of the war, good or bad, and wanted to make her place within society. Long gone were the carefree days of her childhood - she was now nearly an adult witch, coming of age in a time of war and dissension.

Bellatrix was throwing herself headlong into the fray. Narcissa knew she would - as a child Bellatrix had always been the one who decided that they needed to explore or simply do something different and exciting every passing day. Her sister was as passionate as the other Blacks, loud and boisterous about her feelings without a care about anyone else's or what damage her actions might wreak.

Once, Narcissa had watched Bellatrix drop a priceless antique vase from the top landing of Grimmauld Place, watching with delight as the vase, which had survived centuries, plummeted through the air and smashed into dust at the bottom. Their aunt charged out of the sitting room, their mother closely at her heels, demanding to know why Bellatrix had done such a thing.

Her sister, smiling from her lofty perch well above their heads, had replied that she simply had wanted to see what the vase would do, and would Mother kindly repair the vase so she could try again from the next level down?

Narcissa had gasped, watching as her aunt started to scream angrily at Bellatrix, as her mother calmly repaired the vase, as Andromeda and Sirius appeared on a landing wondering what was going on. Her mother levitated the vase back up to Bellatrix, and said, "Only once more, dear."

"Why aren't you punishing the girl?" her aunt demanded.

"Why would I punish a child for having natural curiosity?" her mother replied.

The next time Bellatrix dropped the vase, it hit Regulus in the head, knocking him out cold.

When Regulus was revived, he insisted that Bellatrix had done it on purpose, and the screaming match that ensued had lead to her mother gathering together their things and marching Bellatrix, Andromeda and Narcissa home, muttering about her hotheaded sister-in-law.

Andromeda had never been any better. Narcissa wondered, sometimes, why the penchant for drama and strife had passed her by. Andromeda always spent more time with Sirius than anyone thought entirely proper, considering Sirius had had the audacity to be sorted into Gryffindor, of all houses, no doubt just to spite his parents. Anyone with that lack of foresight or understanding of the repercussions of abandoning family principles as Sirius had would amount to nothing but trouble. Narcissa was certain of such.

Andromeda herself had an alarming tendency to speak civilly to Muggleborns.

Narcissa had stumbled across her chatting amicably to a Muggleborn on more than one occasion, and when she'd call her sister out on it, Andromeda would give her a dreadfully self-important and righteous look before informing Narcissa that people were people, no matter what their circumstance of birth.

Narcissa doubted this theory, as she'd seen quite a number of these supposed people behaving like animals and heathens. Nonetheless, Andromeda's attitude worried her. She didn't act like a proper Black daughter in the least, and above all Narcissa didn't want to lose a sister because of something that could be controlled. Family was too important for that.

* * *

Narcissa was eating her second meal with Lucius Malfoy when the owl came.

The first date she had with Lucius had gone spectacularly. He had been gallant and romantic while she had played the role of the adoring girl beautifully. They both knew they were playing roles, and had used that as a basis of acting silly in public without anyone being any the wiser.

Blacks and Malfoys were to be dignified, and it was a thrilling, forbidden thrill to say outrageous things like, "Of course I shan't think of any other gentleman but you, Mr. Malfoy," and "I shall dream of this evening for the rest of my life if you would do me the honor of kissing me with those rose petal lips." It was a peculiar sort of joke for sharp-tongued snakes raised in environments woven with double talk and hidden meanings, but they enjoyed it full-heartedly.

This date was not as silly as the first, and the conversation had turned to deeper topics when the owl fluttered up to the table and extended a leg towards Narcissa.

She untied the roll of parchment, gave the owl a bit of her roll, and watched it fly away, wondering why her mother's handwriting looked so distressed.

"Ignore me," Lucius said in the tone of one used to urgent missives from home. Narcissa smiled thinly, and opened the parchment with some trepidation.

She couldn't quite stop the gasp that escaped her when she digested what the note said.

"Are you okay?" Lucius asked.

"I'm fine," she said shortly. It couldn't be! Andromeda couldn't have done something so terrible. There had to be some sort of mistake.

"Is it personal?" he asked.

Narcissa nodded mutely, but then, unable to contain such news, the words burst from her lips. "My sister - Andromeda, you probably have met her - left home."

"Left?"

"She's gone blood traitor," Narcissa said numbly. Images of Andromeda - allowing Narcissa to try on her first set of high heels when Narcissa was a child; laughing over the flavor of Bertie Bott's Bellatrix had stuck in Andromeda's mouth while she bravely kept her eyes shut; pulling each other's hair and screaming over something inconsequential - filled her mind, and she couldn't quite digest what had happened. She had owled her sister not two days ago, and nothing had been amiss.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Lucius said after a pause. Narcissa remembered that he had no siblings, and couldn't understand what a sister meant to someone. She'd loved Andromeda, and hated her, and loved and hated her still, but the feelings of betrayal that she now felt were poisoning the happy memories they had together.

"I appreciate that," she replied. She pursed her lips then sighed. "I'm sorry this came at such an inconvenient time. Now our date is ruined."

"That's fine. There'll be plenty more dinners," Lucius replied casually.

"Oh, really," she said primly. "When, exactly, did I agree to that?"

They laughed together, even though Narcissa wanted nothing more than to cry.

* * *

"Keeping family traditions is a way of ensuring immortality."

It was an odd sort of anonymous immortality, but nonetheless it was a way of cheating death through remembrance. Narcissa understood this, she knew Bellatrix understood this, yet her father insisted on repeating it.

Narcissa, for the first time in her life, felt awkward in her own home. She sat stiffly in her chair, staring at her plate with fierce concentration. Across the table, Bellatrix was frowning, and looking back and forth between their parents, who were silently eating.

"Well?" Bellatrix asked. "What are we doing about Andromeda?"

"Doing?" their mother asked, voice raising. "I think she did enough."

"Aren't you going to find her, stop her from disgracing our family further?" Bellatrix asked. "People are talking, Mother."

"There is nothing to be done," their father said. "Just remember how we achieve immortality."

"Maybe if you weren't such goddamn pacifists, Andromeda would have learned what was right and wrong," Bellatrix snapped.

Narcissa dropped her fork.

"How dare you raise your voice to me," their father growled. "Leave my sight."

"Like hell I will," Bellatrix replied. Her eyes were bright and alive, and Narcissa wondered if Bellatrix had fantasized about this moment.

"Bellatrix, please control yourself," their father said coolly. "Rash words only cause trouble."

"Because this family isn't in trouble already," Bellatrix snapped. "Am I the only true Black anymore? We're supposed to be strong! We helped build up the wizarding world from the ruins of the Dark Ages! Our pockets, our minds are what created this world, and now you're just letting Andromeda become one of _them_."

"I rather think I know my family history as well as my daughter," their father said stiffly. He set down his goblet. "And I know that we have retained our place in society by restraining ourselves from rash acts."

"What is rash about keeping a Black from betraying their principles?" Bellatrix demanded. "Andromeda obviously doesn't know what she's doing. Why didn't you stop her from a rash act?"

"Don't you think we tried?" This time, their mother spoke. "We raised her the same way we raised you, Bellatrix. We discouraged this sort of behavior for her, we gave her everything she needed, wanted or desired, but still she betrayed us. Believe me, daughter - you do not understand how we feel about this."

"Then why aren't you doing anything?" Bellatrix was as petulant as she had been as a child, demanding sweets or toys.

"What would you have us do?"

A long, uncomfortable pause.

"Anything. Everything." Bellatrix looked sad. "Why can't we be a proper family again?"

* * *

The room was aglow with flickering red light.

Lucius had chosen an out-of-the way storage room in the cellar of Malfoy Manor, citing soundproofing and wards to hide Dark Magic as the reason for it. Narcissa had agreed with his logic, and had ignored the musty smell and clots of dust in the air.

"Are you sure this is safe?" she asked in a whisper, afraid of speaking aloud in the terse atmosphere.

"Is anything safe?" Lucius responded, carefully adding belladonna to the cauldron in the center of the circle of red candles.

"Some things are," Narcissa replied, "and I don't think this particular activity is on that short list."

Theoretically, a Dark Arts ritual shouldn't terrify her. She was a Black, and had been raised in halls that had seen darker magic than this. Only, she had never been involved in a ritual herself, as her mother had deemed it unsuitable for ladies as well as too dangerous for a child. Narcissa decided she could be unladylike for this occasion, and she knew that she was no child.

The magic they were attempting wasn't the most powerful of Dark Arts, but it was darker than anything either Lucius or Narcissa had ever attempted in Hogwarts lavatories or their own bedrooms with robes stuffed under the door jam and fingers crossed that they wouldn't lose a limb.

"Don't worry, Narcissa," Lucius said, glancing up at her over his shoulder. The red light flickered on his pale face, making him look positively devilish. "I wouldn't let anything happen to you."

They had decided that Lucius would make the potion, while Narcissa would, at the proper time, do the incantation. They were playing to their respective strengths - potions and charms - but Narcissa couldn't help but feel a pang of_ something _knowing that Lucius had taken the more dangerous task for himself.

"It's nearly done," Lucius whispered, stirring the potion counterclockwise. "Just a few more moments..."

Narcissa prepared to say the incantation, wand held firmly in her hand.

The exact color of the potion was hard to discern in the hellishly lit room, but suddenly it bubbled, and began to vaporize. The steam hovered above the cauldron, and Narcissa found Latinate words spilling from her lips as she flicked her wand three times, then swished it at the precise degree dictated in the moldering book they were working from.

The vapor hovered, then, quick as a flash, shot out through the room, hitting her and Lucius directly. She gasped, feeling the cool, icy touch of dark magic leak into her core, and she dropped to her knees.

Lucius looked similarly disarrayed, panting with his eyes wide. The temperature of the room dropped until she could see her breath hovering in the air like a soul. The candles flickered, died, and in the silence that enveloped the room she could hear nothing.

Long seconds passed, then she quietly re-ignited the candles, her voice like a cannon in the silence. She felt utterly exhilarated, and longed to share what she was feeling with Lucius. It felt as though she were going to burst, sitting there still as a corpse while such strong, vibrant urges rattled her very being.

She crawled towards Lucius, not trusting her knees, while he looked around the room with bright, unfocused eyes. When their mouths met in a needy kiss, Narcissa felt as though every kiss they had shared before this were only teasers, preparing her for the real thing.

The air was still frigid, and Lucius moved his hands up and down her arms over her sleeves, and the nearness of his skin made her lean closer, closer until their bodies were touching. Dark magic was cloying in the air, and she breathed it in desperately as she separated from Lucius' kiss.

When she fell back into Lucius' embrace, she knew that what she needed - what the magic was calling for - was contact. She shoved his robes off his shoulders as he pulled hers over her head, loosening bits of hair from her practical bun, knocking it askance. Her newly exposed skin prickled in the freezing air.

In an awkward rush they removed the remaining barriers between them, mindful enough to keep the candles lit and their clothes out of the potion. When their chalk-white skin met under the wicked red illumination, all awkwardness or thoughts of practical matters escaped them completely.

Narcissa found herself trapped under Lucius' body, and reveled in every silken touch between them. The Dark magic in the air seemed to twine its way around their bodies, sliding into every crevice and touching every bit of skin at once. When magically-charged skin met magically-charged skin, Narcissa fancied she could see sparks to match the sensation that filled her.

She writhed under Lucius, feeling every bit the snake she had been raised as the cold floor pressed sharply into her chilled back, pushing herself up against Lucius's impossible warmth. Her moan as he pushed into her echoed through the thick air in sharp contrast to the animalistic sounds they had been producing.

The magic seemed to solidify in the air, heady and persuasive as the pace of their lovemaking increased. With every gasp, Narcissa pulled more of the twining, smoke-filled air into herself, making every touch more sensuous than anything she'd ever felt, building up within herself until it seemed impossible she could feel anything more without simply ceasing to be. She felt Lucius stiffen against her, and then, with back arched and fingers digging into his back, she climaxed.

Time seemed frozen as they caught their breath, still entwined in their embrace. The smoke and magic in the air seemed to dissipate, making breathing and thinking possible. They slowly slid away from each other, boneless as snakes slithering across water.

As she lay panting and sweaty on the cold, dirty floor, a thought occurred to her. "Did the spell work?"

Lucius laughed, tangling his fingers into her long hair. "It certainly did something."

"Was that what it was meant to do?" Narcissa asked. "Because there are easier ways of wooing a lady, you know."

"I wouldn't call that wooing, dearest," Lucius said.

"You know what I mean," she said. "You only said before that this was important for our relationship - what did it do?"

"It was a sort of protection spell," Lucius admitted. "It bound us together."

"Then why is it dark?" Narcissa asked.

Lucius laughed and motioned around the room and at them before resting a hand on her side. "Can you really see this being taught to schoolchildren?"

"I'm sure professors could suck the life out of something like that," Narcissa replied primly. "What sort of binding did it do?"

"Basically," Lucius said, "it grants a certain degree of protection over our union."

"But why all that trouble simply for protection over just a few minutes?" Narcissa asked. She'd known from her own readings that it had been a protection spell, and therefore hadn't worried too greatly about adverse effects for herself, but the reason why was still a mystery for her.

Lucius laughed, low and masculine in a way that sent shivers down Narcissa's spine. "Not that union, Narcissa." He sat up, and reached into the cauldron before she could stop him. He pulled out something small and sparkly, which he slid on her finger as he whispered, "This one. If you'll have me, of course."

Narcissa stared at the ring, and said, "Yes, I'll have you," before throwing herself into his arms again.

* * *

Lucius escorted her to Bellatrix's wedding, looking noble and handsome in richly textured black robes. Narcissa loved the feel of his robes against her hands or cheek, and she knew Lucius wore them for that very reason.

Bellatrix had a massive gala thrown to celebrate her nuptials. Narcissa couldn't help but feel it was a farewell party, leaving her alone as the sole Black daughter as Bellatrix joined the Lestrange family. Narcissa's own wedding was planned for the following year, and she looked forward to it with the same sort of fervent longing that all girls felt when they thought of their weddings. She couldn't quite get used to the fact that after that, her name would no longer be Narcissa Black, but Narcissa Malfoy.

Narcissa had helped her sister dress for her wedding, and had been slightly shocked when she'd spied the mark marring Bellatrix's arm.

"You haven't done anything stupid, have you?" she'd asked, staring pointedly at the mark.

"Oh, damn," Bellatrix had said, staring accusingly at the mark. "That will look terrible with these robes." She cast a glamour spell, frowning at her arm as the mark faded into creamy white skin. She smiled at Narcissa, and picked at a stray strand of hair. "Fix this for me, will you? You've always been better at hair charms."

Now, Narcissa was wondering how far Bellatrix had taken her loyalty. She knew that Lucius had joined the ranks of Lord Voldemort's followers, and somehow she knew that he would be fine. Lucius was strong and influential, and would not fall too deeply into the temptation of the Dark Arts to lose sight of what was important. Bellatrix was not nearly as callous and cold as Lucius, and Narcissa feared that she would become too firmly entrenched in the way of the Death Eaters to keep herself out of trouble.

Narcissa herself did not necessarily disapprove of the Dark Arts, or the other dark things the Death Eaters did in the midnight hours, but knew that the rest of the world did. Lucius would keep his hands clean enough to escape negative attention, but Bellatrix had always been impetuous and passionate. She was fully a Black, and Narcissa could not help but think that nothing good would come of Bellatrix devoting herself fully to the Dark Lord.

"Narcissa, would you like to dance?" She glanced over to see Regulus standing tall and handsome in his new dress robes.

"Of course I would," Narcissa replied, offering her hand.

As they twirled around the dance floor, Narcissa couldn't help but notice the expression of worry on Regulus's features. "What's wrong?" she gently asked.

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" Regulus asked in a rush, schooling his features so that he appeared to the rest of the ballroom to be asking her something trivial.

"I've taken many dancing lessons," Narcissa replied glibly, knowing perfectly well she was evading the question.

Regulus gave her a familiar look - she'd seen it on Bellatrix, Andromeda's and her own face before - and said, "You know what I mean."

"I love Lucius," Narcissa replied. "And I can handle him."

"Can you, or do you just think you can?" His stare was penetrating, and Narcissa felt vaguely uncomfortable with her cousin for the first time in her life.

"What are you getting at, Regulus?" Narcissa demanded, smiling. She refused to cause a scene at her sister's wedding.

"He's a dangerous man, Narcissa. I don't want to see you get hurt." Regulus was dead serious.

"Shouldn't you be giving this lecture to Bellatrix?"

"She's not like you, Narcissa."

"Are you saying I'm too weak to be Lucius' wife?" Narcissa asked, indignant. "Because I assure you, Regulus Black, I am hardly weak. Lucius might be dangerous to other people, but not to me. Never to me."

"You can't be positive of that," Regulus said. His hand gripped hers tight.

"I can," Narcissa said confidently. "Remember, Regulus, I'm as much a Black as you are. I can handle myself. You just worry about yourself."

The song ended, and Regulus abruptly left her standing on the dance floor.

"May I have this dance?" she turned to find Rabastan Lestrange smiling at her, and she accepted his sun darkened hand in her pale one as a new song began. She met Lucius's eyes over Rabastan's shoulder, and smiled at him. He was standing between Macnair, Crabbe and Goyle, looking impossibly pale and slender against their bulky forms, and his responding smile gave her a pleasant shiver deep inside.

Bellatrix approached, hand in hand with Rodolphus, while the group laughed at some comment Lucius made to the newlyweds.

Narcissa allowed her body to move freely to the music, and whirled away.


	2. Part Two: The Pastoral or Arcadian State

The Course of Empire

Summary: As the world goes down in flames, Narcissa Malfoy tries to hold on to everything she once thought was dear.

Notes: Thanks to Rainpuddle13 for beta reading! This story was influenced by and has some scenes based on _Gone with the Wind_ by Margaret Mitchell. Story title/chapter titles come from a series of paintings by Thomas Cole.

Part Two: The Pastoral or Arcadian State

* * *

The ball appeared to be nothing more than a gathering of the elite, such as had been occurring regularly for the past millennia.

Narcissa Malfoy stood with a group of witches, all dressed in colorful robes of the most expensive materials, and casually discussed the cause. They all thought it was a disgrace that filth was allowed to walk the streets with their children, and be educated in the same classrooms. They wanted to preserve the old ways.

Narcissa's hand curled around her belly, understanding fully the fears of her companions. She smiled as she saw her husband Lucius talking animatedly with a group of Lestranges and Notts, his pale hair brighter than normal when surrounded by dark-haired wizards. She cannot hear their conversation, but knows Lucius is enjoying himself.

"Narcissa," she heard one of the witches say, then lower her voice to a whisper to say, "Isn't it beautiful how in love she is?"

"Hmm?" Narcissa said, turning her attention back to her friends.

"Your child is going to be lovely," said Innogen Parkinson, who was heavily pregnant herself. "The babe is sure to get your coloring."

"Isn't it precious how Narcissa and Lucius already looked like family before they even shared a name?" Bellatrix's voice cut through the group.

The other witches stiffened, thinking a gauntlet had just been thrown, but Narcissa laughed. "As though you and Rodolphus look so vastly different." Lucius and Rodolphus's respective resemblances to their wives had long since become a joke between the sisters.

"Attention! Attention!" called a voice from the front of the room, and everyone angled to see old Ezekiel Nott. "Our master would like to extend his thanks to everyone who has shown their support tonight. As we all know, an unfortunate raid by Aurors has severely depleted the supplies of our noble cause. Therefore, tonight we are asking for donations. Any contribution to further aid our fight against the degradation of our society will be noted and appreciated by the Dark Lord."

Bellatrix moved away, and pulled something glimmering from her handbag. Narcissa recognized it immediately as the invisibility cloak that belonged to the Black family, a cloak that dated back over a hundred years. "Bellatrix," she hissed. "What are you doing?"

"The war is more important than schoolboy mischief," Bellatrix said, and strode towards Ezekiel. Narcissa watched her go, feeling a sinking sensation in her core. The cloak had belonged to the heir of the Black line for four generations. If anyone had right to donate it to the noble cause, it would be Regulus, whom she had not seen this evening.

Later that night, she asked her husband if he knew what Bellatrix had done.

His silence was telling.

"Please, don't let it be Regulus," she said. "I couldn't bear to lose him, too."

"I'm sorry for your loss, dear," Lucius said. "I argued for him, but the Dark Lord insisted that he pay the price."

"What did he do?" Narcissa asked.

"He tried to turn away," Lucius replied. "The Dark Lord does not look kindly on cowards, especially in those who bore his mark."

"But Regulus was the heir to the house of Black!" Narcissa said, horrified. Her child would be a Malfoy, as any Bellatrix bore would be a Lestrange. Regulus was their only chance left, now that Sirius had shown himself to be a blood traitor. She couldn't bear the thought of the Blacks dying with her generation. It made her feel like a failure.

"Bellatrix said the same thing," Lucius said. "But it did not change things. She was the one to take care of him. He went well."

Narcissa turned away, and pressed a hand to the gently moving child in her womb. Her sister had always hated that she had been born a girl, and therefore was expected to bear the heirs of another family, and become integrated into their family rather than remain in her own. Bellatrix had always wanted to be the heir of the Blacks, and now it seemed she had achieved her aim, thanks to two blood traitors and one untimely death.

Narcissa only wished that the family hadn't had to perish completely in order for her sister to be happy as successor of it.

* * *

The night Narcissa went into labor, Lucius was not home.

He had felt the call at dinner, and she had watched him leave with a faint pang she had not fully understood at the time. She always felt something when Lucius left for business with the Dark Lord, a sort of vague fear that he might not return, but this time it had been something different.

It was fear for herself. Somehow, watching him pull on those ink black robes, she knew that he would miss something important if he left.

"Lucius, must you go?" she implored, resting one hand on her belly. "You know the child is coming soon."

"I have to go," Lucius said, pulling her close. "You know that. The Dark Lord does not accept excuses."

But beneath his curt tone, Narcissa knew that Lucius was trying desperately to think of any way out of the night's festivities. "Is something dangerous planned for tonight?"

"We're to find the Prewitt brothers," Lucius said. "Make them see the truth in the Cause."

"They can very well see the truth without you there!" Narcissa snapped. "Lucius, this is important to me! I want you here with me tonight, not cavorting about the countryside flinging dark curses at redheaded miscreants!"

"Narcissa," Lucius said with a hint of pleading. "You know I can't disobey the Dark Lord."

"No, you're his regular little slave boy," Narcissa replied. "But I'm warning you, if I have this child tonight, I'm naming him."

"But we've already decided the name," Lucius said. "Decimus Lucius Malfoy. It's already been monogrammed on the baby blankets."

"Then I'll be sure to use the same initials," Narcissa replied coyly. "Are you sure you have to go?"

"Positive," Lucius replied before kissing her gently. "I wish I could stay here - I'll leave as soon as possible."

"Fine," Narcissa said, biting at her lip nervously. "Is Bellatrix supposed to be there?"

Lucius nodded, and Narcissa felt very alone.

"I might Floo Innogen. I don't feel like being alone," Narcissa said. She'd rather spend time with her sister, but Death Eater activities took up more and more of Bellatrix's time. The Lestranges were involved much deeper than Lucius was, simply because they were both members and had no children to fret over.

"I don't want you to be alone," Lucius said regretfully. He kissed her again, and then kneeled and kissed her swollen belly, as had become his custom. "I'll be back."

"I love you," Narcissa said. "So be careful."

"I always am," Lucius replied. "I love you both."

With a _pop_, he was gone.

Narcissa sighed. Somehow, the thought of Lucius serving the Dark Lord had been more appealing before it inconvenienced her. The cause was noble and true, but the absences she had to endure from her husband and the nervousness she felt when she thought of all the things that could happen were overwhelming her sense of patriotism. She wouldn't suggest that Lucius become less involved - that was impossible - but she couldn't help but to wish somehow he would be able to wrench his life along a slightly different path.

She wasn't entirely sure that the Dark Lord's aims were the same as her and Lucius' aims. She hadn't felt so since Regulus had died in the service of his master, but it was useless to think about. Lucius was bound inextricably to the Dark Lord, and she was bound body and soul to Lucius.

Narcissa carefully made her way down the staircase to the ground floor, planning on Flooing Innogen from the library. There was something soothing about the walls of books and the masculine scent of leather and pipe smoke that lingered in that room that made it Narcissa's favorite place to wait evenings for Lucius to return, immersing herself in books.

Innogen agreed to come over, and Narcissa felt unexplained relief upon finding herself with more company than the house-elves.

"You look dreadful," Innogen said bluntly as she took in Narcissa's appearance after tea, then understanding dawned on her. "You're going to have the baby!"

Narcissa shook her head. "No, I haven't had any proper pains yet."

Innogen insisted on calling Narcissa's Healer, and soon the matronly woman was bustling about, insisting that Narcissa would give birth that night. As Narcissa was denying the idea yet again, her water broke, and she was forced to agree that yes, it was likely that the baby was going to be born sooner rather than later.

"Come, let's get you to bed," her Healer announced, helping Narcissa to her convalescence bed, which had been prepared for weeks.

The birthing process blurred in Narcissa's mind, thanks to the concoctions the Healer insisted she take and the enchantments that kept her from feeling the brunt of the pain. Most of her memories centered around fervent wishes that Lucius was present, and mental curses against the Dark Lord and the Prewitt brothers indiscriminately for denying her of her husband's soothing presence.

When the squalling, red baby was placed in her arms, carefully swathed in white blankets, Narcissa immediately forgot about the Prewitts, Dark Lord and Lucius' absence.

"He's such a dear!" Innogen whispered, taking stroking one of Narcissa's son's hands.

Narcissa nodded mutely.

After a few minutes of cooing over the baby, the Healer came over with a roll of parchment in one hand. "I know the father isn't present, but normally old families already have the babe's name chosen well before this point," she said cheerfully. "Would you like me to go ahead and record it?"

Narcissa, still feeling the effects of the potions she had taken coursing through her system, recalled her earlier conversation with her husband and nodded. "His name is Draco Lucius Malfoy."

Innogen started. "Wasn't it meant to be--"

Narcissa shushed her, and the Healer smiled as she wrote down the name. "Going back to your family traditions, aren't we, deary?"

Narcissa nodded, and smiled. The Healer checked on her a few more times, then finally announced that she was much too tired to look after a perfectly healthy woman, and left after leaving some strict instructions Innogen promised to adhere to.

Narcissa had drifted off several times, and was just finishing feeding Draco when Innogen said, "I'll be in the sitting room if you need me," and left quickly.

Narcissa looked up to see Lucius staring at her with an indescribable expression on his face, one she had never seen before.

"I just got home," he said, and took a few careful steps towards her, as though she might break.

"I'd hope so," Narcissa said pertly. "I've missed you dreadfully."

Lucius sat down on the edge of the bed, still looking at her as though he'd never seen her before. "I'm sorry I wasn't here," he said. "I left as soon--"

"Shhh," Narcissa said. "None of that sort of talk right now, especially not in front of him."

Lucius nodded, and carefully stroked Draco's bald head. "He hasn't any hair."

"Most babies don't," Narcissa replied, as though she knew anything about most babies.

"And he's so small - I didn't think he'd be so small," Lucius continued.

"He is," Narcissa said, carefully cradling him. It was amazing how he fit in her arms, and she marveled at the feel of his tiny weight against her.

"Can I hold Decimus?" Lucius asked, trying to hide his pride at his new son and failing miserably.

"No," Narcissa said. Lucius looked at her sharply, and she could practically feel his indignation as he opened his mouth. Narcissa cut him off. "You can hold Draco, though."

Shock filtered across Lucius' face. "Draco? You must be joking."

"It's already down on the birth certificate, which I believe the Healer took to register at the Ministry," Narcissa said triumphantly.

"We'd already decided on a name," Lucius said, obviously at a loss as to what to do in the case of a wrongly named child.

"And we'd decided you would be here when he was born. Things change," Narcissa replied, carefully moving Draco so she could ease him into his father's arms.

"But Draco is a Black name," Lucius said petulantly. "And this child is a Malfoy through and through. Look at him!"

Narcissa laughed, looking between her husband and child. "Then having a Black name won't mar him in the least."

"You'll pay for this, witch," Lucius growled playfully. He began to lean towards her, but then remembered the child in his arms, and stiffened, as to not break him. Draco responded by scrunching up his face and screaming.

"He's protective of his mother," Narcissa said with a smile.

"Smart boy," Lucius replied. "Not that his mother needs that much protection."

They shared a light-hearted smile over the head of the new addition to their family.

* * *

Lucius' arrest was not a surprise.

A friend within the Wizengamot had warned them of the inevitability of legal action, and she knew Lucius had already begun the delicate process of padding the right pockets and buttering up the right politicians and judges to help make his trial go smoothly.

She sat in the audience during the hearing, tired from a sleepless night of tossing and turning in a bed much too large for her alone. She had wanted to have Draco in her arms all night, reminding her that even if the worst happened she still had part of Lucius to care for, but she was shooed away from his crib by an elderly house-elf, telling her that Mistress should not let the young Master know anything was amiss.

She had not listened to the damned elf that morning, and had dressed young Draco in the finest robes he owned, dark blue ones charmed to not show unsightly spit-up accidents or drool. She had carried him herself, leaving the pram at the Manor, relishing his weight on her hip and the surprised looks on the gathered witches and wizard's faces at the sight of Narcissa Malfoy doing something so overtly maternal and crass.

Once finding her seat, she had settled Draco on her lap, fiddling with an animated plush dragon he was enamored with while waiting for testimony to begin. Narcissa steeled herself not to flinch when her husband entered the room dressed in Azkaban robes rather than his normal, refined attire, and made herself ignore the faintly haunted look in his eyes from a night of being guarded by Dementors.

If things went according to plan, he would not have to sleep under soul-sucking supervision ever again. But if things went badly... If the public's thirst for blood outweighed the strength of their carefully planned argument... She couldn't bear to think of what would happen to her husband.

Lucius found her in the crowd, and she saw a ghost of a smile at the sight of his one year old son chewing on a stuffed dragon. She'd known that he would appreciate the sight if the worst happened, and would appreciate both of their presences even more in the case of acquittal.

She felt someone sit beside her, and she glanced over to see her sister lounging on the hard bench, dressed in evening robes and smirking at the procession below.

"Ridiculous, isn't it?" Bellatrix asked.

"Not at all," she replied evenly.

"This trial is a farce," Bellatrix said, voice rising. Narcissa resisted the urge to shush her. "Like any true follower of our Master would turn their back on him now, of all times, we're being tested!"

Narcissa made a noncommittal noise, and hoped Bellatrix would leave before Lucius began his testimony. "Please, Bellatrix, just... Stay quiet," she asked, before an untimely outburst could ruin her family.

Bellatrix looked incredulous, and hissed, "What, have you no loyalty?"

"Loyalty is a Hufflepuff trait, dear," Narcissa whispered as Lucius began to describe the _Imperius_ curse he had been victim to. "Slytherins think for themselves."

* * *

Narcissa did not attend her sister's trial.

She was unsurprised when she heard of the outcome, and knew Bellatrix was happy with her decision to be true to the cause. Narcissa was weary of the cause, weary of Aurors and war and happy to live life free with her husband and son at her side.

One day, less than a week after Bellatrix was condemned to Azkaban, an unfamiliar owl landed by Narcissa at lunch. The creature held out its leg patiently as Narcissa tried to place it, then finally took the letter. The owl flew away immediately, not waiting for a response or a treat, which struck Narcissa as odd.

She unrolled the parchment, and was shocked to find it was a letter from Andromeda.

She hadn't heard from her sister since before she had left the Black family to marry a Mudblood and become a disgrace. She considered burning the letter and pretending she had never gotten it, but she had already lost one sister this week. Perhaps Andromeda was repentant.

She read the letter, and immediately regretted it. Her sister not only had the indecency to be happy with her new lot in life, but had born a halfblood child. Her letter bragged about the whelp's metamorphmagus ability, and had the audacity to suggest that they meet.

_Please,_ the letter implored. _I miss you._

Narcissa carefully ripped the letter to pieces, wondering when it was that she became the only Black left with sense and spine intact.


	3. Part Three: The Consummation of Empire

The Course of Empire

Summary: As the world goes down in flames, Narcissa Malfoy tries to hold on to everything she once thought was dear.

Pairings: Narcissa/Lucius, eventual Draco/Ginny

Rating: PG-15/R

Notes: Thanks to Rainpuddle13 for beta reading! This story was influenced by and has some scenes based on Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. Story title/chapter titles come from a series of paintings by Thomas Cole.

Part Three: The Consummation of Empire

* * *

Years of peace settled the Malfoys into complacency.

Their combined wealth allowed them to do whatever they wished whenever they desired, and without the fear of imprisonment for association with a rival politician such as the Dark Lord, Lucius grew bored easily. The result was him reverting back to teenage mischief, playing with the relics of the war they had lost thanks to an infant and performing Dark Arts rituals.

They snubbed their noses at the sad, filthy excuses for wizardkind that were seen milling around Diagon Alley around the start of the school term, rooting through sale bins and ordering the cheapest dishes on the menus of any given establishment. The Weasley family, in particular, grated on Lucius's nerves. They were a prime example of everything he had believed, of every thing wrong with society that had lead him to think the Dark Lord had the right idea about things.

In a world where halfbloods and Mudbloods dressed themselves in finery and put gems around their necks, a pureblood family dressed in secondhand rags. Mudbloods worked high-ranking jobs while purebloods languished in poverty. Of course, Lucius thought that the fact they bred like rabbits had something to do with their poor financial state, but that did not erase their pure bloodlines.

Their failure proved everything he believed was true, and he scorned them for it.

When the war broke out again, Lucius seemed to relish it. Narcissa rather thought he fancied himself twenty years old again, and a freedom fighter for a noble cause. She had not missed the action of those days as much as he had. She had never been quite as involved, after all, and then she'd had a child to worry about. She still did, though with every day, Draco wanted her to worry less.

She might have been disillusioned, but she couldn't shatter Lucius' confidence. She was willing to throw herself to the wolves on his account, and so she did everything she could to ensure that what he did succeeded.

So she went to her parties, dressed in her finery and glimmering with priceless jewels. She lived up to her name through appearances and quiet power. She used the advantages her birth had given to her, but somehow they weren't enough. Somehow, everything that she and Lucius were doing crumbled. The ages past and people long dead were irrelevant, the new world whispered to her. The ways of their ancestors was nothing but wispy memory, and they had no reason to try to revive them. To try and keep things the way they had been.

Resistance proved to be utterly and completely futile. The ways of the past were dead, and Narcissa had no place in the new world that had emerged from their ashes.

* * *

The Malfoy fortune had been seized by the Ministry of Magic soon after the end of the War.

Though the new leaders of magical Britain thought that a Death Eater's proper place was Azkaban, there simply had not been the resources in the ravaged economic system to support such a venture. The Dementors, who had sided with the Dark Lord, had been destroyed by powerful light magic, and with the sudden drop in the workforce due to casualties, Azkaban became a place to house only those who were an active threat.

Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy had been deemed fit for magic reduction and seizure of assets. Had Lucius been sent to Azkaban permanently, his property would have transferred to his wife. Had she been sent as well, their son would have received his rightful inheritance.

By deeming the Malfoys non-threatening, the Ministry had come into a sizeable fortune.

Their wands had been taken in those first confusing days after the Dark Lord fell for the second time. Within weeks, while they were still in holding cells, their property and assets were pillaged. By the time they were issued wands that would perform only the most rudimentary of spells and were charmed to self-destruct if anything forbidden was cast, their vaults in Gringotts had been emptied, and they were told that they were lucky that they would get to keep their house and its grounds, simply because the Ministry could not think of a use for them since they had gained a reputation for being saturated in dark magic.

After being Portkeyed into their home, they barely recognized it. Valuable antiques and magical artifacts were missing. Several carpets, centuries old and handmade by Persian wizards and witches, charmed to give luck and success and interwoven with powerful magic, were missing. Narcissa was appalled to find that all her silk unmentionables were curiously absent from her bureau.

But, they should be grateful to be allowed to keep their home. They should be glad they weren't sent to Azkaban for fighting on the wrong side of the war. They should thank God and Merlin and Harry Potter alike for the mere fact they still lived.

* * *

There was a child staring at her with unabashed curiosity. Narcissa resisted the childish urge to stick her tongue out at it as the mother of the brat jerked it away, the child still staring in awe at her as it hurried alongside its mother.

Narcissa glanced at Lucius, but he didn't appear to have noticed the child, nor the other dozen people who were also staring. His head was high and he looked as imperious as ever.

Lucius' brand had faded, but it was as though they had both gained new brands, marking them as something wrong. Something monstrous.

A shop boy dropped an armful of books as they entered Flourish and Blotts, but Narcissa did not allow her peaceful demeanor to falter. She browsed the charm section, idly tracing her fingers along the gold-printed spines of a series of books on the various ways various objects could dance when she heard the something worse than the staring. Loud, careless whispers.

"Can you believe they have the gall to be seen in public?"

"It's a shame they weren't put in Azkaban like they deserve."

"–right hand man, don't you know, and her sister was the one who--"

"–can't believe that sort are allowed in shops as though they were regular citizens--"

"Murderers and thieves, the whole lot of 'em..."

"What a disgrace to the name of--"

Narcissa turned slowly, trying to block the sound out of her head. Someone grabbed her arm, and she jumped before realizing it was Lucius, leading her towards the exit, sneering at the other patrons of the shop.

"Where are we going?" she asked, keeping up with Lucius' long strides through Diagon Alley.

"Leaky Cauldron," he replied shortly. Narcissa knew that the words had stung him as much as she. How could those people have thought that they were the disgraces? Everything they had done had been to preserve the good name of wizardkind, to uphold honor and integrity in the broken society that surrounded them.

Why were they the monsters?

When they stepped inside the Leaky Cauldron, an uncomfortable silence fell. Lucius strode towards the bar, where the barkeep was wiping the counter while looking apprehensive.

Narcissa flitted behind her husband, discomforted by the angry, accusing glares of the people around the pub.

Lucius' path towards the barkeep was interrupted by a tall, redheaded man. "They don't serve your sort here, Malfoy."

"Stand aside, Weasley," Lucius sneered. "Where I dine doesn't involve you in the least."

"Wizarding Statute Number 5623 clearly states that former convicts are not allowed on the premises of businesses whose owners ban such people from entering," Weasley said.

"I see no such ban," Lucius said coldly.

Weasley flicked his wand, and a sign appeared on the wall stating that Death Eaters were not welcome.

Lucius stepped forward, and Narcissa knew she had to do something to stop some sort of madness from occurring. "Lucius, dear," she said, stepping alongside him and taking his arm. "I've lost my appetite."

Lucius looked at her, and she was surprised by how angry he appeared. She began to walk gracefully towards the exit, and Lucius wisely chose to accompany her.

"Why did you give in?" he hissed when they were safely in the street.

"They aren't worth it, dear. They're filth, and the only way they can live with themselves is to punish people who think differently than they," Narcissa said. "I don't want to lose you because you couldn't hold your temper around a Gryffindor."

They began a long, disheartened journey home. Narcissa privately swore she wouldn't make herself a target for humiliation like that ever again.

* * *

One day Narcissa received a letter from Innogen Parkinson filled with suspicious gaps in a body wrought with incomplete ideas. She eyed the blank spaces of parchment before addressing her husband.

"Darling," she said. "I think the Ministry edited the directions for Innogen's headache potion."

"Why would they do that? It doesn't even work properly when she makes it," Lucius replied, folding his newspaper.

"I'm not entirely sure," Narcissa responded, then added cattily, "Perhaps this has something to do with the war we just lost?"

"It's not as though there are any secrets left," Lucius said evenly. "Let them read our post. Do write something flattering about me, dear. I want the Aurors on our case to not be able to look me in the eye."

Narcissa laughed nervously.

"They've freed the house-elves," Lucius said.

"They've what?" Narcissa asked, an unfamiliar shrillness lacing her voice. "How can they _free_ the house-elves? They're born for servitude!"

"Apparently, the 'enforced slavery' of house-elves is inhumane." Lucius sounded inexplicably amused.

"Well, we just won't," Narcissa said stubbornly. "We only have three, and they've been with us forever. They won't want to be free."

"Oh, there's more," Lucius said.

"What, hardened criminals such as us aren't allowed servants now, even if they want to serve us?"

"Close," Lucius said, grinning. "They've created a house-elf colony."

"A what?"

"You heard me. Freetopia, they've named it. Apparently, all house-elves must be relinquished so they can live there, free from bondage."

"That's just silly!" Narcissa said, bewildered. "What will house-elves do without...houses?"

Lucius shook his head.

"Oh, Draco is going to be so sad when he hears Mammy has been sent to Freetopia," Narcissa fretted. "She's been with me since I was a child, you know, and she always cared for Draco as though he were her own." A terrible thought occurred to her. "Who will do the cooking and cleaning once they've been taken? You know what an unaccountably close eye the Ministry keeps on us these days, of course they're going to personally escort our house-elves to that preposterous colony."

"According to this article, Muggles hire other Muggles to serve them," Lucius said.

"That's obscene!" Narcissa said, shocked. "Besides, we can't afford to pay a witch to do all those things."

"Don't you see? Who needs money now?" Lucius asked.

What Lucius was hinting at dawned on Narcissa with sickening clarity. "They've freed the house-elves and shipped them away so they could hire people like us to serve them?"

"Can you think of any other logical reason for it?"

Narcissa's hand politely drifted over her gaping mouth as she thought it over. "I would sooner starve than wait on Mudbloods."

"Maybe we'll get to," Lucius offered. "Prices are sky high on food."

"They have? The house-elves hadn't mentioned anything," Narcissa said, looking guiltily at her half-eaten breakfast.

"I've been keeping an eye on things," Lucius said. He paused, and then spoke again reluctantly. "I'm not sure we're going to make it, Narcissa."

"What do you mean?" she asked. "We'll do fine. We always have."

"We don't have any assets," Lucius said. "We have exactly two Galleons to our name. There is nothing in the Manor that would bring in any amount of money, and we can't borrow against our property thanks to a law passed a few months ago. Narcissa, we have nothing."

Narcissa looked around the grand room they sat in, and at the gouged, ruined table where they took their meals. "I have some jewelry left. It's not much, just some gold earrings and a brooch that belonged to my great-grandmother."

"Do you really think we'd be able to sell it? The Ministry left us nothing. The only reason we still have two Galleons is I took a few of the books from the library to Borgin and Burkes as soon as we were released."

"They've shut down Borgin and Burkes, haven't they?" Narcissa asked, knowing the answer.

"Every shop in Knockturn Alley, regardless of legality, has been shut down and condemned."

Narcissa took a deep breath then said, "Then we have no choice. I'll try to find work."

Lucius raised an eyebrow skeptically.

"Well, you can't be hired," she said. "Not with your criminal record. But I was just accused of aiding and abetting. Surely someplace would hire me."

"Narcissa, I don't want you to humiliate yourself like that," Lucius said.

"Humiliate myself?" she snapped. "I rather think starving to death would be more humiliating than working."

"That's not what I meant and you know it," her husband said. "You're a Malfoy, and loathe as I am to admit it, the name no longer commands respect. We're the villains, dear. The Dark Lord is conveniently dead, and we are the ones left to blame the horrors of the war on. No one is going to hire you, no one will give us a chance for redemption and begging will only give them something to laugh about over dinner."

"But what will we do?" Narcissa asked in a small voice.

"Whatever we have to," Lucius said. "We'll survive. We'll make them regret this one day."

"How can you be so sure?" Narcissa asked.

"Look around you!" Lucius looked more animated than he had since the Dark Lord had been decimated by a cocky teenager. "Our ancestors built this out of nothing. Our ancestors provided us with the best of everything by being the best at everything. We are of the same mold as they were, and we will make it through this."

"But now isn't like before when we got off without punishment and fortune intact, Lucius. There is no second chance for us. We threw everything in with the Dark Lord, knowing that he wouldn't fail us twice, and look what happened! We're a laughingstock! I just can't bear it anymore," Narcissa said.

"They still fear us," Lucius said. "They're trying to hard to break our power long after we thought we had lost it all. For them to continue to make these foolish laws, for them to dedicate so much manpower to watching us in today's poor economy - we have to hold some sort of power."

"But we don't know what that power is," Narcissa said.

"Of course we do. I told you, we're the villains. Our power is ruthlessness, amorality and greed. We are a threat to their utopia by simply proving people are not inherently good." Lucius' smile was demonic, and Narcissa knew her reciprocal smile was a knowing one.

* * *

She had excelled at Herbology at Hogwarts, even though she had despised the feel of dirt under her fingernails. Now, she looked through the gardens at the Manor with a fresh eye, looking for things she could salvage or, ideally, eat.

The rare plants had all been removed, likely sold for the Ministry's profit. The spots where plants of a more dubious nature had stood were now merely singe marks. Delicate tropical plants had been trampled, and it looked as though Thestrals had been harnessed in other areas.

She was thrilled to notice that the Mandrakes had not been uprooted. If they were still viable, she could attempt a powerful restorative draught that, possibly, could revive some of the plants that remained.

She looked around her garden, which once had existed only to showcase their wealth and provide aesthetic value to their home, and saw its possibilities. They could survive off what this land could provide them - magic, luck and work could keep them from begging like the fallen, destitute remains of a glamorous society that they were.

She would make this garden into something substantive. She had all the time in the world to devote to it.

* * *

When the Parkinsons invited them over for tea, Narcissa's first impulse was to turn down the invitation. She hated the thought of being seen in her outdated robes with her nails broken from gardening, but the thought of having interaction with her old friends again was too tempting a thought to refuse.

Lucius was enthusiastic about getting to see other people in the same sort of situation as they were, and Narcissa quietly thought that he simply missed having people to sneer at and manipulate.

She dressed in her nicest robes - they were only a bit faded and outdated - and carefully styled her hair. Appearances were everything in these lawless days. Anyone who appeared to be wealthy, appeared affluent was considered thus. Anyone who looked noble _was_ noble. It was a disgusting system to those who had educated themselves in the nuances of society, to those who had worked hard and formed their lives on the basic principles of the society that was moldering in history books, but the new order of wealth and prosperity had decided it was the way things ought to be.

Traveling to the Parkinson's home while staying within the Ministry's strict rules for travel was a tiresome experience, and by the time they arrived at the Parkinson's doorstep, Lucius had lost his enthusiasm to see other people, whereas Narcissa was simply just exhausted.

"Narcissa! Lucius!" cried Innogen, smiling prettily as she greeted them. Narcissa managed to not recoil at the sight of a missing tooth in Innogen's formerly flawless smile.

"Innogen, it's lovely to see you," Narcissa said graciously, hiding all the revulsion she felt as she stepped across the threshold and saw how filthy the house they were dining in was. The walls looked as though they had been scorched, and the rail on the staircase was broken and burned.

"Come, come," Innogen said eagerly. As she turned to lead the way, Narcissa couldn't help but notice that her hair was matted and dirty, a far cry from the prissy Innogen who had once refused to set foot outside her dorm with a hair out of place.

Lucius caught her eye, and shook his head. It was disconcerting, seeing someone who had once been such a part of her life so obviously broken.

They entered the sitting room, where Edna Goyle sat on a sofa with Horace Bulstrode.

"Oh, goody, the Malfoys have arrived!" Edna chortled.

Narcissa wasn't quite sure what the proper response to that pronouncement was, as no one had ever said such a thing in her presence before. Lucius raised an eyebrow and made himself comfortable in the armchair. Narcissa sat on the other sofa next to Innogen, wondering where everyone else was.

"Are we the last to arrive?" she asked finally.

"Yes," Innogen replied. "I was so terribly delighted that you decided to come. I'd heard you were doing poorly, and had hoped you hadn't gotten depressed."

"Simply dreadful, what those people are doing," Edna said. "My poor boy's working in a factory, you know. They manufacture clocks."

"How dreadful," Narcissa said.

"But at least he made a good marriage," Edna continued, giving Horace an admiring look. "Millicent's a lovely girl."

"Always has been," Horace replied dimly.

Narcissa remembered her childhood, listening to the adults discussing politics and literature, planning to change the laws they disagreed with and forcing others to succumb to their wishes, and felt a horrible pit in her stomach. This was what was left of the beautiful world of her childhood - a hag, a simpering woman and a blubbering idiot. Were she and Lucius the only proud, true people left in this horrid, broken world?

"What happened to your home?" Narcissa asked bluntly, breaking into Edna's hopes and dreams of a grandchild soon.

"Excuse me?" Innogen asked.

"It's all burnt!" Narcissa said. "And everything is filthy."

"Well, we haven't any house-elves," Innogen said.

"Neither have we," Narcissa replied, "and yet somehow I don't look like a hag."

Lucius laid a warning hand on her forearm, but Narcissa would not be quelled. "What has happened to us? We used to be on top of the world, and now we're just... Skeletons of who we were born to be, dying in the broken shells of our youths!"

"Narcissa, we shan't have that sort of talk here," Horace said. "You'll upset the ladies."

"What ladies?" Narcissa snapped, standing. "You might have forgotten who you are, but I know who I am. I was born a Black. I am a Malfoy. The world should bow down to my wishes, not the other way around!"

"You're starting to sound like that mad sister of yours used to," Edna said disapprovingly.

"And you used to respect Bellatrix - I remember you telling me I ought to have more of her fire," Narcissa replied. "Maybe Bellatrix was right. Maybe going down in a blaze of glory was the answer, rather than rotting alive in purgatory!"

"I just wanted to have tea!" Innogen wailed. "Narcissa, you're ruining my day! Quit talking about the bloody war! It's over and we lost. The end."

"That isn't the end," Narcissa snapped. "Look at us! We're letting it be the end!"

"You used to be such a level-headed girl," Horace said. "Why do you let her run amuck like this, Lucius? A proper husband would stop this madness."

Lucius rose, looking around the room with contempt and hatred in his eyes. "Narcissa is hardly the mad one," he said coldly. "I'd say she's the only one here with a grasp on the situation." He turned to her. "Come, dear."

Narcissa took his proffered arm, and didn't look back. Friendship offered her nothing now. They alone were the sort of people she knew were important in this world - the strong ones.


	4. Part Four: Destruction

The Course of Empire

Summary: As the world goes down in flames, Narcissa Malfoy tries to hold on to everything she once thought was dear.

Pairings: Narcissa/Lucius, eventual Draco/Ginny

Rating: PG-15/R

Notes: Thanks to Rainpuddle13 for beta reading! This story was influenced by and has some scenes based on _Gone with the Wind _by Margaret Mitchell. Story title/chapter titles come from a series of paintings by Thomas Cole,

**Part Four: Destruction

* * *

**

When the heavy knock sounded through the house, Narcissa was startled. No one had knocked on their front door since before the war ended, and at first the once-familiar sound was alien to her ears.

She rose from her chair in the library, and brushed the particles of leaking stuffing from her skirt. She met Lucius in the foyer, where he was waiting outside of his study for her.

"Who could it be?" she asked, watching the door warily.

"Aurors don't knock," Lucius said. "And our friends Floo in. I haven't the slightest idea who it might be."

"We should," Narcissa began, then waved her hand to indicate _something_.

Lucius strode to the door, and swung it open with confidence. She could tell by his stance that he was sneering whoever stood outside as he said, "Yes?"

She crossed the foyer to stand at her husband's side, and saw a wizard with an official badge pinned to his robes standing on their doorstep. "Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy?" he squeaked, despite the fact that due to both positive and negative publicity over the past two decades, they were two of the most recognizable people in wizarding Britain.

"What do you want?" asked Lucius.

"I'm Jasper Fincklestien from the Department of Magical Assets," said the wizard. It was a Mudblood then, to add insult to injury. "I'm to serve you these documents, and inform you of several matters."

"What matters?" Lucius asked, voice low and dangerous.

"Matters concerning the taxes on your property," said the Mudblood. "You have outstanding property taxes amounting to five hundred galleons. There is a fifty galleon fee for your Floo connections, anti-Muggle wards, cloaking spells and Ministry mandated magic detectors. Also, there is a five galleon fee for processing your documents and for failure to file your claim."

"When are these due?" Narcissa asked.

"By the first of the month, ma'am," replied the Mudblood, handing the roll of parchment to Lucius. "If you have not paid all accounts in full by then, the house and property will be auctioned to pay off your debt."

"I see," Lucius said coldly.

The Mudblood looked around fervently, then said, "And I know for a fact someone is interested in purchasing it."

"Who?"

"Arthur Weasley. He's been acquiring a lot of magical property lately, and has expressed explicit interest in buying yours. I thought you should know. If you haven't paid by the first, then I'm afraid you'll be out on the streets."

"Shouldn't we have received notification of this sooner? The first is in three weeks," Narcissa asked.

"Owls were sent, Mrs. Malfoy. It is not our responsibility to see that they get to the recipient." With a nod of his head, he Apparated away.

Narcissa stepped out of the dusty foyer into the midday gloom. "We haven't ten galleons to our name."

"I know."

"We have nothing that could be sold for more than a few sickles. Even if everything in the house was sold, even if we desecrated the portraits and pried stone from the foundation, we couldn't come up with that much money in such a short time."

"How nice is your great-grandmother's brooch?" Lucius asked.

"It's not worth anything near five hundred galleons," Narcissa said shortly.

Lucius shook his head. "What's the first step to borrowing money?"

"To look as though you don't actually need it," Narcissa said. "But no one's going to lend us anything."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. We've burned all our bridges," Narcissa replied, then paused. "Except for... No, that would never work. I was terrible to her!"

"One thing I know about you Blacks is that you are terribly devoted to what you believe," Lucius said.

"Andromeda did write me once, after Bellatrix went to Azkaban," Narcissa said. "Maybe she'll help me now." The words tasted bitter. "But I can't go asking for money looking like a hag!"

"We'll come up with something," Lucius replied.

* * *

Two days later, while Lucius was reading over the documents detailing the taxes looking for some possible loophole, Narcissa climbed the rickety stairs into the attic, hoping to find something she had overlooked in her previous sojourns.

Trunks once filled with the decadent relics of past lives had been pillaged by Aurors and Ministry financiers, leaving behind only the dregs and garbage of generations. The sumptuous clothing that remained was aged and moth-eaten to such a degree that not enough fabric was salvageable for even a patchwork robe.

Narcissa sighed. She had known it was hopeless when she climbed the stairs. She had already searched the attic countless times, hoping to find something of value that had passed unnoticed under the eye of their sanctioned robbers. She sat down on a large trunk, and leaned against the dusty, dark wall.

She was shocked when the wall was not entirely solid.

It wasn't magic - all the illusion spells had long since been broken. But she watched as the wall rippled, and realized that she had leaned against a curtain. She looked carefully at the shadowy walls, and realized that floor-length drapes were placed at intermittent intervals. They were old and coated in thick layers of dust and grime which dulled their black fabric to an Augean shade which blended into the shadows.

She stood, and with some effort pushed the trunk she had rested on away from the wall.

There were still piles of rubbish holding the drapes against the wall, but she could pull away the edge and see what condition it was in. She could barely hold back a cry of joy when pulled back the black velvet to reveal a lining of sheer white silk

She decided not to wait on Lucius to help her, but jerked on the drapes until the rod broke free, falling heavily to the floor in a pile of grey and white fabric. She gathered it up and hurried towards the stairs, leaving sunlight filtering into the attic through dirty glass for the first time in decades.

"Lucius!" she called before sneezing into her armload of dust and drapery. "Look!"

"Darling, we have drapes on all the windows," he said.

"And they shall remain on the windows, because I'm going to wear these!" she said excitedly. She held up a handful of silk. "Look, won't this be a most lovely dress? And these will make beautiful robes! Andromeda won't think we're in need of charity."

"They're filthy," Lucius said. "And discolored."

"That's just from the sun - the tinting spells must have failed sometime since the War. But they can be cleaned, and they aren't threadbare." She picked at the fabric then called, "Mammy!"

"I'm afraid I have something to tell you," Lucius said.

"Oh, I can't bear anymore bad news, darling. Mammy! Where are you?"

"They came," Lucius said.

Narcissa sank down onto a chair. "Not the Ministry!"

Lucius nodded gravely.

"But we relinquished the two house-elves - I thought they would be busy for months, working on enforcing more new legislation. They can't have taken Mammy," Narcissa said numbly. The bold, motherly house-elf had been part of her life since childhood. It seemed wrong that she would be taken away because of what someone else thought was best for her- Narcissa was her family, not the simpering masses of house-elves that would live in the ridiculous colony.

Lucius sat beside her, and pulled her close.

"Who's going to make my new robes?" Narcissa asked. "And dinner - I can't make dinner!"

"We'll survive, Narcissa. You know we will. We've made it this far," Lucius said, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

"But-"

"Come along, dear. Let's take your mind off this," Lucius said, standing and taking her hand before leading her upstairs, draperies lying forgotten on the floor. "I know just the thing."

Narcissa followed him to their bedchamber, but couldn't quite forget the heaviness that had settled in her heart.

* * *

Andromeda's mouth dropped into an unseemly display of surprise when she opened her door. "Narcissa!"

"Andromeda," Narcissa said pleasantly, smiling. "It's wonderful to see you."

"It's wonderful to see you, too," Andromeda said, not quite hiding her confusion. "You're looking well."

Narcissa resisted the urge to glance at the dress robes she had slaved over, and simply inclined her head and replied, "As are you. Life seems to have treated you kindly."

There was an awkward pause.

"I don't mean to be crass, but what the hell are you doing here?" Andromeda demanded.

"Shouldn't we take this inside?" Narcissa replied. "It's a mite uncomfortable, standing out in the weather."

"Yes, of course," Andromeda replied automatically, and gestured for Narcissa to follow her inside.

Andromeda's home appeared perfectly bourgeoisie, but Narcissa's trained eye knew that the furniture, rugs and even knickknacks were priceless. She perched on the edge of the sofa Andromeda motioned for her to sit on, and accepted the offer of tea. While Andromeda poured, Narcissa looked at the family picture sitting on a side table, watching as her sister smiled and laughed with a handsome brown-haired man and a pretty teenage girl with vibrant red curls.

"Is that Nymphadora?" Narcissa asked, motioning towards the picture.

Andromeda appeared startled. "Yes, and that's Ted - I doubt you remember him."

"It is doubtful, as I don't recall ever being introduced," Narcissa replied.

"Are you insane?" Andromeda snapped. "I think you've gone utterly around the bend, Narcissa. You haven't spoken to me in twenty years. You've pretended I don't even exist, and now suddenly you're in my bloody Muggle house acting contrite over never being introduced to my husband!"

Narcissa replied evenly, "You know, I didn't remember you being this quick-tempered. It's almost like visiting Bellatrix, for sheer paranoia."

Andromeda took a deep breath then said, "I would appreciate it if you didn't compare me to that monster. What are you here for?"

"I want my share of our parent's estate," Narcissa replied.

"Pardon?"

"Our parent's estate. I know you inherited at least part of it; you wouldn't have been able to afford that Magi-Persian rug over there on your Mudblood's salary. I'm not going to try for true fairness and ask for what Mother would have willed for me to inherit, but I do want some."

"I cannot believe your gall," Andromeda said. "Coming into my home, demanding money and insulting my husband! Out!"

Narcissa had no intention of leaving until she had the Galleons she needed to keep the Manor in hand.

"Didn't you hear me?" Andromeda asked.

"Andromeda, sit down and finish your tea," Narcissa said in the same tone she had used on Draco when he threw tantrums as a child.

"Why would I do that, when you've come around begging? It's hardly as though you need it, in your big house with your rich clothes," Andromeda snapped, motioning angrily.

"I have some investments I'm interested in," Narcissa said smoothly.

Andromeda narrowed her eyes, suspicious. "I thought criminals couldn't invest."

"I'm not a criminal," Narcissa ground out.

"You are in the eyes of the Ministry. They take treason very seriously these days," Andromeda continued. "By all rights, you should be dressed in rags. I don't know how you've always managed to avoid the punishments you deserve, Narcissa, but I'm going to happily spend every sickle of Mother and Father's money on my Muggle-born husband and my halfblood daughter."

"But I _need_," Narcissa began, then stopped herself. She was coming dangerously close to pleading, to begging and losing all the dignity she had fought to keep. "I'll be going."

"You can see yourself out," Andromeda replied. "Don't come again."

Narcissa rose, turning to her sister. "I wouldn't dream of it, Andromeda. As far as I'm concerned, I no longer have a sister."

"You've thought that for a long time, Narcissa. Don't act as though it's something new."

Narcissa strode out of the room and out the front door, which she managed to not slam by using what was left of her willpower. She made it halfway down the block before her legs gave out on her, and she slumped down on the pavement, wrapping her arms around her knees, ignoring the piteous picture she undoubtedly made. She was a beggar, now. She would be homeless, and might as well get used to sitting on the street. A Weasley would own her home and she and Lucius would end up like the Parkinsons, pathetic and destitute beyond words.

No, she refused to become like Innogen, lurking around Hogsmeade hoping for a spare Knut from anyone who would part with it. She refused to sell herself or work herself bloody for scraps. She would choose death before dishonor, because she knew that was the route Lucius would have them take. Her proud husband could scarcely stand their existence now. There was no question of the path he would choose when he learned their gamble had failed miserably.

"Are you okay?" a concerned voice asked.

Narcissa jerked her head up to see the brown-haired man from the picture in Andromeda's sitting room staring down at her. "I'm well, thank you," she said, motioning for him to go about his business.

"No, you hardly look well," he said. "Would you like to come with me and have a spot of tea?"

Narcissa fought back the swell of laughter bubbling in her throat. "No, thank you. I scarcely think that would be well received."

With some effort, she stood, ignoring the helping hand.

"Of course you would be welcome," he began, then stopped short as he took in Narcissa's appearance. "Wait, you're Narcissa Malfoy."

"And you're Andromeda's pet Mudblood," Narcissa said recklessly. "How do you do?"

"Why were you sitting on the pavement?" Ted asked, brows drawn together.

"Despair," Narcissa replied. "You see, your darling wife has just condemned me, and I simply wanted to relish the moment. If you don't mind, I'm off to my home, to tell my husband the delightful news."

"You aren't making any sense," Ted said.

"You must promise not to tell," Narcissa said. "At least, not until after the funeral when my reputation no longer matters."

"Funeral?"

"Is that a promise?"

"Yes, I promise not to tell," Ted said.

"They took everything we had," Narcissa said. "Cleared out the vaults, pillaged the manor, even uprooted the garden."

"Who?"

"The Ministry, of course, the dirty bastards," Narcissa said.

"You look as though you're doing fine," Ted said, motioning towards her brooch and robes.

"I'm wearing draperies," Narcissa said. "Sewed it myself, when they took Mammy away. It took me nearly two weeks, and now we've only a few days left to pay."

"Pay what?" Ted asked, wisely ignoring the issue of Mammy.

"The taxes. They took everything we had, everything we had to give our son, but left us our Manor because it couldn't be sold, not with the reputation it had gotten. And now, we haven't ten galleons to our name but owe 555 galleons to the bloody, goddamn Ministry because they couldn't be arsed to put us in prison!" Narcissa said, gesturing wildly. "And now, if you don't mind, I'm off to break the news to Lucius that Andromeda wouldn't give me my share of our parent's estate."

Ted looked overwhelmed. "What–"

"Good day, Mudblood," Narcissa said, and walked quickly away, ignoring his yell.

Thanks to the restriction on Apparation that was part of her terms of release from Ministry custody, Narcissa had to walk to the nearest sanctioned Floo station, which was a wearisome task. She calmed down enough after a while of walking at a brisk pace to realize how unhinged she had become during her conversation with the Mudblood. The fact that she had not only spoken to but confessed her debt to the Mudblood made her feel as though she were losing her mind.

A shadow flew over her head, and she scowled. Everything was falling apart, and the last thing she needed was to find bird droppings in her hair. She realized, though, that the shadow had belonged to an own that was now perched on a fence beside the pavement.

The bird hooted at her, and she stopped short and glared at it. A bag was hanging from its foot, and she carefully removed it, and the note with her name scrawled across it. The note was brief.

_Consider it part of your parent's estate, _

_Ted._

Narcissa wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. She opened the bag, and found it contained six hundred galleons - much more than she needed. The Mudblood must have Apparated straight to Gringott's and sent it straight to her - they'd spoken less than half an hour before.

Narcissa smiled as she thought of what Bellatrix would have said to learn her good sister was taking charity from a Mudblood. Narcissa wouldn't snuff this gift, because above all, she cared for her own well-being. Morals could come after she had paid the taxes.

* * *

The Auror points his wand at the pile of books, the combined history of two families stretching back infinitely, and his spell is ineffective. The books have not survived centuries without protection. They can only be destroyed by their owners - the children of their creators, the descendants of the ones who spelled them.

Narcissa is wrenched back, a man's rough hands gripping her brittle hair and a wand jabbed into her neck. The Unforgivables are allowed, but no Auror uses the Imperious.

Lucius stares at them, at the Auror she can't see, with hatred in his eyes.

"Destroy the books," the grizzled Auror says, one eye swiveling slowly in its socket.

Lucius does not raise his child wand. "I can't."

"Destroy the damn books, or your wife's fate is no one's fault but your own."

"I can't," Lucius repeats, anger and frustration evident in his rising tone. Narcissa wants to lay a comforting hand on his forearm, where another sort of comfort once marked his flesh, but cannot. Hairs have ripped from her skull in the Auror's hand, and the sharp pain keeps her alert.

"I knew Death Eaters didn't care about anything, including their whores," an Auror sneers.

Lucius looks at the Auror with utter contempt, and Narcissa sees the man she married underneath the grime and gauntness. "I can't destroy the books with this sorry excuse of a _wand_, Mudblood."

The wand at Narcissa's jugular stabs into her flesh, and she jerks. More hair is ripped free of her scalp, and she lets out an involuntary whimper. She hates her weakness as her husband looks at her. She knows him well enough to recognize love and anger mixed in his glare, knows him well enough to know the anger is for the Auror who hurt her.

"Look, even the Death Eater thinks his whore is useless and pitiful," mocks an Auror.

"We can't do any magic more complex than first year spells with the goddamned wands your Ministry issued us," snapped Narcissa. "That's why he can't destroy the bloody books."

She is knocked to the ground for her effort, and stays down, unwilling to receive a _Cruciatus_ curse from another Auror.

Mad-Eye Moody picks up a red volume from the pile of condemned books, and attempts to rip a page out. Nothing happens. "We're going to have to confiscate these."

"We can't have such dark books in the Ministry. They have to be destroyed," argued another Auror.

"One of them has to do it," acknowledged the Auror still standing over Narcissa. She was surprised he didn't spit on her; the scorn in his voice was overwhelming.

Moody looked from one Malfoy to the other, then said, "Bring in their boy, and hold him and Lucius at wandpoint. This little lady will do exactly what we say if she doesn't want her family to be the next two casualties of war."

The looming Auror strode out the door of the library as Narcissa gasped. Draco was home for a visit, and she couldn't bear it if he was brought to harm. The Auror returned moments later levitating Draco, caught stunned and in a full body bind, behind him. Lucius had wands lowered on him.

"So much as one move we don't instruct, and they both die," Moody said clearly.

"Why not just _Imperius_ her?" asked the Auror moving towards Lucius.

"Because their sort have immunities to the Unforgivables. Comes from generations of using them without thought," Moody replied. He grabbed Narcissa by the arm, and said, "You will perform only one spell, the one to destroy these books. You will hand the wand right back to me. You will not make any movement besides flicking the wand. If you do anything other than perform this spell, your husband and son die."

From Lucius' expression as she was handed her only chance at causing harm to those who had broken their society, he would gladly martyr himself to see Moody die. Narcissa could not bear the thought of living without her family - they were all she had left in this broken, destroyed world.

She swished and flicked the wand, and whispered the two syllables it took to utterly destroy the lifetime works of dozens of Malfoys and Blacks. Diaries, experiments, recipes, potions and spells burned to ash as she stared hypnotized. The wand was taken from her hand as she watched pages crumble to dust as she watched words and knowledge blacken and fade.

* * *

The day the law forbidding images of dark wizards to remain in Britain passed, Narcissa cried.

Not two hours after reading of the approved law in the Ministry-sponsored newspaper over her meager breakfast of Ministry-supplied porridge, three cracks sounded in the foyer. The law allowing Aurors entrance in any home belonging to a former convict had been in effect for several months, and she had grown warily used to the sound of Aurors entering without warning. She approached the Aurors cautiously. She had washed her face the best she could, and without her glamour spells she knew her earlier tears were still evident in the puffy redness of her eyes.

"We are here about the Official Restriction of Dark Paraphernalia," announced one fresh-faced Auror. He was as young as her son, no doubt sped through Auror training in order to replenish lives lost during the War.

"Is it any use to argue that none of my ancestors were Dark Paraphernalia?" inquired Narcissa cooly, wishing she'd had more time to somehow hide the paintings of her beloved ancestors, and Lucius' favorite ancestors. She didn't imagine they would leave any stone uncovered, and Malfoy Manor had long since been raped of every secret, but still she wished.

The young Auror snorted, and said, "Hendrick, Moon, take the upstairs. I'll take the gallery."

Lucius emerged from his study, where he spent days scrawling on scraps of parliament before _scourgify-_ing the ink away and starting anew. There was a blot of ink next to his nose, and Narcissa walked over to touch his arm.

"Are they here already?" he said disbelievingly, watching the scarlet robes of the Aurors ascend the stairs. "I figured we'd have until lunchtime to say goodbye..."

"Apparently there are no criminals in this delightful new utopia to occupy their time," Narcissa said bitterly, trying not to hear the painted screams coming from the gallery and floating down the stairs. They remained standing, Narcissa leaning against her husband's familiar form, heads lowered in a sign of respect for the dead who were being erased from their plane of existence.

The Aurors returned an hour later, administered a stern warning about the dire consequences they would face if they harbored illegal paintings, and left without further ado.

"We should go see," Lucius said, straightening. "Perhaps the damage will not be as terrible as we imagine."

"Perhaps," Narcissa replied thinly.

The moment they stepped into the gallery, she knew their false hope had been foolish as a schoolgirl's dreams. The gallery was a long, narrow room with a stone floor caked with dust and dirt. The floor was a relic of the earliest part of the Manor, built in Roman times and containing a fortified cellar in case of attack by blue-painted natives or desperate Vikings. The walls were whitewashed and lined with portraits of Malfoys crowded with intermittent Black family paintings she had rescued from her childhood home before it was seized by the Ministry.

The floor was covered in footprints and scuff marks, and more than a few splashes of viscous white paint. The paintings themselves were completely coated with the vile substance, and it was dripped and splashed on the priceless frames that even starvation couldn't bring Narcissa and Lucius to sell to blood traitors and Mudbloods. In the corner rested an empty pail with the white paint sloshed down the side, though the WWW emblem of the Weasley brother's business was still discernable on one side.

Narcissa approached the painting that had been of her mother, and said softly, "Mother?"

Silence surrounded the blank, white canvas.

"Maybe we can scrub this off," she said. "Maybe we could just save enough for a face to peek through, for them to be able to tell us what to do."

"They haven't been able to help us thus far," reminded Lucius gently. "And remember, these were just reflections of the people they were. They were already dead."

But the glaring white of the canvases and the harsh stringent stench of paint made the room seem claustrophobic, and Narcissa strode out.

* * *

That night, she felt Lucius leave her bed. She mumbled and rolled over, but heard the bedroom door click closed. She slid herself back under the moth-eaten blankets, and had just slipped back into a fuzzy half-sleep when a yell jerked her into reality.

"DAMN IT ALL!"

Two, three, four bangs sounded, and Narcissa hurried into the hall. Lucius was slumped against the wall, clenching rapidly bruising fists at his sides, muttering obscenities. His shoulder were shaking in a way entirely unfamiliar, and Narcissa approached him as though he were a wounded beast.

"I just wanted to make things right," he whispered, raising his head to peer at her through tangled hair, his voice cracking in a way she hadn't heard since laughing times in the Slytherin common room, when the biggest worry they had was completing an essay or winning a Quidditch match. "All this is my fault. If I'd have focused on our family, on us, on our future, we would be the ones laughing over the poor and creating laws. My mother's face would still smile at me from the gallery, and we could be real people again."

"Darling, no," Narcissa whispered back, horrified. If Lucius was having doubts, if her confident husband no longer believed they were right, then there would be no hope left. No deep-rooted belief that they were right, that they would one day see justice for these wrongs. She had to have support, they had to be there for each other, or else there would be nothing left for them. They might as well be dead if what he was saying was true.

"But it's so much," Lucius said. "I thought things were bad, when the Dark Lord fell the first time, when I nearly went to Azkaban. But now - now I don't see any way through this. Look at us, Narcissa. We're wearing rags and eating charity-given food. Our son is ashamed of us."

"Damn the boy, if he doesn't see what I see when I look at you," Narcissa said. "And you always have me, Lucius. You always have, and you always will. Nothing will deny us of each other." She wrapped her arms around him, and they both sank to the floor.

"I just can't bear it, Narcissa. Look around you," Lucius said quietly. "Generation after generation of Malfoys took this place, this name, the family fortune and turned it into more. They built it up, built a reputation out of nothing more than a bloodline, and created something more than any individual could. And now - now my decision has damned us all. My one folly has condemned our family to destitution."

"It wasn't just your decision," Narcissa insisted. "And any Malfoy in your position would have done the same. It was a matter of self-respect."

"It's easy to make it seem dignified now," said Lucius, a wry grin playing at his mouth. "It's easy to pretend I didn't have a choice. But I did, and look at where it got me."

He shoved up the sleeve of his shirt, and held out the unmarred forearm that had for years born the mark of another. "I betrayed you with taking that mark, Narcissa. I betrayed the Malfoy line, and I betrayed our son. I should have seen that things would work out this way--"

"Seen? Are you a seer, Lucius Malfoy?" Narcissa asked, incensed. "Could you look into a teacup and see doom written in the stars? Could you really have looked at all your teachings, all the dignity of the pureblood cause and everything we had ever learned from our forbearers, and told them all they were wrong? That this outlandish notion of exalting others on the basis of nothing more than what one lifetime manages to achieve would be prevalent, rather than generations of accomplishments being admired? Could you?"

Lucius stared at her as though she was a stranger, but she couldn't stop the words from escaping from her mouth like a death-rattle. "Could any of us?"

* * *

The white paint obliterated all evidence of what the paintings had been of, yet when Narcissa walked through the dusty, decaying halls of her home, she could hear the paintings whisper.

Nothing was ever clear. No words could be discerned even if she stood corpse-still and stilled her breath, closed her eyes and cocked her head to the side, straining as hard as she could to just _hear_. But the distant echo-whispers drifted from ruined frames until Narcissa just wanted to scream for them to speak clearly and enunciate, like she had been taught as a girl. Like they had taught her.

Some days, all she does is roam the halls, and some days, she thinks she might be going mad.


	5. Part Five: Desolation

The Course of Empire

AN: Thanks to everyone who commented. Thanks to Rainpuddle for beta reading. Some scenes are based on Gone With The Wind by Margaret Mitchell, chapter/story titles are based on a series of paintings by Thomas Cole.

* * *

Part Five: Desolation

* * *

"Draco never visits us," Narcissa said, looking sadly at the short note their son had sent them. "I think we saw more of him when he was at Hogwarts than we have lately."

"He's been spending time with _them_," Lucius said darkly. "Severus has convinced the boy of... Something."

"Why would Draco look up to Severus, of all people? It's not as though he's a stellar example of wizardkind," Narcissa said. "That man is just so cantankerous! Being near him always reminds me of my Aunt Merope, who couldn't say a single thing if it didn't insult someone."

"I don't think we did right by our son, Narcissa," Lucius said. Narcissa had never heard him say such, even though sometimes, she quietly wondered. "He's never been as strong or independent as I would have liked."

"We did everything possible to ensure he had a good life and a future worth living in," Narcissa said. "Remember those books we used to read him, before he decided they were too childish, just in the hope that he would grow to appreciate knowledge?"

"I remember those atrocious things. _K is for Kneazel_, or some such nonsense," Lucius said. "I always felt like a prat reading those, but Draco loved them."

"All I ever wanted was for him to be happy," Narcissa said. "But I never imagined that his happiness would be found with that sort."

"They all have an aura of self-righteousness and brute power," Lucius said. "Maybe Draco just can't tell the difference between people playing the part of leader and those who truly lead."

Narcissa sighed. "I just wish our family lines didn't end on such a sad note. Maybe things would have been different if Draco had had a brother to keep him on track."

"What's to stop us from fixing that?" Lucius said.

"What?" Narcissa asked. "Have another child, hoping that this one will understand our values? It's madness, Lucius. We're the outcasts of society. We haven't enough money to support ourselves, much less a child. What sort of life could we provide?"

"We have room for a child," Lucius said, motioning around their grand, decaying surroundings. "We have all the time in the world to devote to someone new."

"But children eat, and need clothing. We can barely provide for ourselves. Not to mention what the healers at St. Mungo's charge," Narcissa argued, though the thought of a baby filled the hole that had been growing in her heart. "It's utter insanity to plan a child now, Lucius. We must forget this idea."

Lucius, after some coaxing, agreed, but Narcissa kept one traitorous thought from being voiced. Accidents do happen.

* * *

Draco's shirt was crisp and new.

Narcissa had nearly forgotten the look of sharp white collars against the baby pale skin of a Malfoy, or the way bright blond hair looked against midnight black robes. Their clothes were soft and spiderweb thin from repeated washings and being worn without rest, their black robes gone soft Azkaban gray.

But her son stood in the empty, dusty foyer of Malfoy Manor wearing perfect, new clothes and Narcissa felt betrayal rise in her chest.

"Where did you get that?" she demanded, her voice sounding shrill and shrewish.

"Mother," he said calmly. Lucius emerged from his study, and stood in the corridor, watching the scene unfold.

"Draco, please. I can't bear it if you–"

"If I what? Want to live, rather than rot away here?" her son interrupted, anger flushing his face pink.

"Don't do this!" Narcissa replied. "Don't become like _them_, a blood traitor..."

"I'll do whatever I damn well please," Draco snapped. "I'm happy."

Narcissa remembered happiness, remembered sun drenched days in the green grass, surrounded by family and friends in a world they ruled.

"Happy?" Her voice rose to a high pitch. "How does betrayal make you _happy_?"

"I'm going to ask Ginny Weasley to marry me," her son continued. Now that she had grown used to seeing something fresh and new, she could see imperfections in her son's attire. The crisp cotton shirt held imperfections - a mismatched button, snags in the fabric - and the robes were of a poor quality. Her son was wearing new clothes, yes, but they were obviously the cheapest ones off the rack. She wondered if this Weasley girl could even discern the difference between sale rack and tailor made robes, and decided not.

"A Weasley!" This time, Lucius spoke. "Draco, have you lost all self-respect?"

"Times have changed! If I change with them, eventually people will forget that I was born into such a small-minded family!"

"Small-minded? Draco, listen to yourself! I'm your mother, the only one you'll ever have. You are only born into one family. Don't betray us, love," Narcissa implored.

"I'm not betraying anything!"

"You're betraying your family. You are a Malfoy, boy. Act like it," Lucius said coldly.

"That's right. I'm a Malfoy and I'm taking what I want. You only disapprove because you wish you were part of the new aristocracy. I'm in love, and I have new things, and if I just break free of _you_ then I won't have this stigma anymore. Your grandchildren will be pureblood. Be happy with that."

Her son dismissed them as though they were dogs begging for scraps.

"I'm sorry you feel this way," Lucius said coldly. "Now leave."

"But–"

"Leave," Lucius said, his voice going low and dangerous. For a moment, he was the man who thought he could take on Albus Dumbledore and Lord Voldemort and the entire Ministry without losing face.

For a minute, he was whole again, and it was to throw his son out. The son they had done everything for, the son he and Narcissa had devoted their lives to.

Draco looked between his parents as though he were seeing them for the first time, then said stiffly, "I thought you would want to know your son was happy."

"Go," Narcissa said. "Have your happy ending. We aren't stopping you. You know as well as we that we're powerless to keep you from them."

"You could be happy too," Draco said. "I could tell them that you've--"

"That we've what? Decided that we can't handle the repercussions of our actions? Decided to betray our own beliefs for what is acceptable by the masses?" Narcissa asked. "We've fought tooth and nail to keep what we have, Draco. We've forged our lives out of the need to create a better future - to preserve the ways of our ancestors, the way we were brought up. I can't abandon everything I hold sacred."

"But this isn't sacred!" Draco said. "It's the past. The past doesn't mean anything."

"If you really believe that, then you are a fool," Lucius said.

* * *

By the time Narcissa was sure, Lucius had already figured it out.

She announced the news over lunch, and her husband merely raised an eyebrow and said, "I thought you said we couldn't provide a good life for a child."

"Accidents do happen," she said coyly, and took a dainty bite of her sandwich.

"Maybe we'll have a daughter," Lucius said. "A little girl as pretty and wicked as yourself."

"Nonsense," Narcissa said. "As though any child of ours will be wicked. Besides, I'm hoping for another son. I'm sure we will have regained our former status by the time he's of age, and it'd be nice to have another Malfoy to inherit."

"I haven't disinherited Draco yet," Lucius said.

"Only because he'd laugh at you," Narcissa said bluntly. "Because we haven't anything for him to inherit, other than the Manor."

"He'd be fool to laugh at that," Lucius said. "I taught him myself that this land is more precious than gold in the bank."

Narcissa shook her head. "He doesn't believe that. I'm not sure I do."

"This is the house my ancestors built," Lucius said. "Their accomplishments, their ambitions are what raised these walls. Generations of Malfoys have loved and died within this house, and that is important in a way that being able to afford racing brooms or bribes can never be."

"I felt that way about the Black home," Narcissa said. "Though not as strongly. I always knew that I would leave, and cease to be a Black. But you're right. There is something special about walking the same halls as your long-dead ancestors, but I don't think Draco remembers that. Look at who he associates with. Not one of them has the family history, the material manifestation of family pride to respect, that we do."

* * *

Narcissa's dream for a better future did not last long.

By the time she acknowledged something was deeply wrong, nothing could be done. She lay on blood soaked bed sheets as the Healer comforted her, casting spells and administering potions to keep Narcissa calm and to keep her life's blood from leaking out with her dead child.

Lucius was not present.

"I'm sorry," said the Healer, an old pureblood woman who had delivered Draco decades before. "You'll never bear another child."

Narcissa's soul was as barren as her womb.

"You'll still have your health, which is all that you could hope for, really," said the Healer. "Though I am worried for you."

"I'm fine," Narcissa said weakly.

"Losing a child--" the Healer began.

"Are you sure that I won't be able to have another child?" Narcissa inquired quickly.

"Positive," the Healer said. "But you should be worried about your own health. You'll be weak for a good while."

Narcissa tuned her out and stared listlessly at the wall. Lucius would be devastated. She was devastated, and there was no one to blame but herself and fate. There was no place for her type in the world any longer.

She would continue along, just as she always had. Even though her dreams were dashed against the rocky shore of reality, even though she wanted nothing more than to simply curl in bed and never wake again, even though she knew there was nothing left in this world for her, she would continue to exist.

* * *

Have your happy ending, Narcissa thought bitterly. Pretend like the world is just and happy, just like you always imagined it. Pretend like there's nothing amiss, there's no reason to cry, pretend like the world is a beautiful utopia you've designed.

Pretend, because the truth is so far away from utopia that it aches.

They couldn't understand, Narcissa knew. They were all so caught up in their own lives and own triumphs and failures that they couldn't see that they had destroyed everything. Destroyed her, and her family, and all her hopes and dreams and aspirations.

She couldn't bear the thought of her former friends, rotting away in the broken shells of their formerly beautiful homes. She hated to think of the ones who went to Azkaban, the ones driven mad by their imprisonment, because she felt as though they were the lucky ones. In their fevered, mad brains they could imagine the world was any way they wanted, and they were the only ones miserable.

Narcissa knew better than to hope that reality was better than madness. She only had to see what was going on around her to know that she was a relic of the past, outdated and left to molder in a forgotten case.

In her dreams, she saw the smiling face of a pretty young girl, blonde and happy, playing in the gardens and with broken dolls that held infinite, sentimental meaning to her. She wasn't sure if the girl was herself or the daughter she had tried so hard to keep, and she wasn't sure it mattered. Neither girl would ever have a happy life. Both were dead, in their own ways.

Lucius had taken the news well, as though he had realized all along that they were striving for an unattainable dream. As though he knew they had nothing left to fight for.

Narcissa wished she could tell Innogen of her dreams, but it was always a shock to remember that Innogen was gone. She wasn't dead, but Narcissa thought she would have been happier had she died during the war like her daughter.

Narcissa had dreamed once upon a time that her son would marry Innogen's daughter. It had seemed such a natural, simple thing at the time, and now it was nothing more than ash, filling her mind with the embers and broken remains of what she had once hoped.

Draco was never around. He rarely owled, as caught up in his new life with the new people who had taken over society. She ought to feel grateful that her son was making something of his life, changing with the times, but still the only emotion she felt was betrayal. She had done everything possible to ensure him the life she had wanted, and she hadn't been good enough.

Nothing they had done had been good enough to withstand the sands of time. Her House had fallen, her family was in ruins and the only thing she had left in the world was her husband, and the hollow, decaying walls they lived between.

Time slid past her, unnoticed in the monotony of days. Her beauty had faded, but she did notr mourn its loss. Seeing a pretty, unaffected face in the mirror would have been the ultimate irony, and one Narcissa did not wish to occur. Her hair was storm-shot with silvery grey, her face wrinkling and puckering around the edges, and Narcissa felt old as time itself.

It was only years, years of sorrow and hatred and broken thoughts, but they affected her like centuries.

* * *

The next time she saw Draco, he was married.

He's sent them a note a week previously informing them of such, and had said he would bring his bride for them to meet at a specified time. He didn't suggest meeting outside of the Manor. Narcissa could only suppose he was embarrassed by them, by their poverty and their infamy. She couldn't say that she blamed him, exactly, only felt vaguely it would have been nice to leave the Manor.

At the appointed time, a knock came at the front door, and Lucius and Narcissa rose to meet their son's bride.

The girl wasn't quite the dirty-faced urchin Lucius had given Tom Riddle's diary to lifetimes ago, but her appearance hadn't gone through any radical change to erase the traces of her humble roots. Now, her face was clean, and she wore bright, expensive robes that Narcissa privately thought erred more on the side of gaudy than fashionable.

"It's nice to meet you again," she said politely, and Narcissa appreciated that she was trying to be civil, though the tremor in her voice and her clenched fist gave away her discomfort.

"Likewise, I'm charmed," Narcissa said, smiling thinly. "Of course, it would have been more appropriate had we met before you married my son."

The girl looked at Draco nervously. He glared at her, and said, "Mother, I thought you agreed to be civil."

"I'm disappointed in you as well, Draco. You're my only child, yet you didn't even invite me to your wedding," Narcissa continued. He was the only child she would ever have and he no longer wanted her. The war had taken everything from her, and given nothing back.

"Isn't this the Weasley whelp who was so easily taken by that old diary?" Lucius asked conversationally. "Are you sure she's bright enough for you? You don't want to be rearing halfwits."

Draco looked despairingly between his parents while his wife looked increasingly uncomfortable. Narcissa felt a vague stab of guilt, remembering how warmly Lucius' family had welcomed her into the Malfoy fold. She would make an effort, at the very least.

"Let's go to the garden," Narcissa said. "I thought we'd have lunch outdoors since it's such a lovely day."

The girl look startled, as though she had expected to only see the foyer before being thrown out, but she and Draco followed Narcissa's lead obediently. Narcissa tried to ignore the disrepair the Manor had fallen into over the years since the end of the War, but knew that Draco and his wife would be seeing everything - the worn, damaged furniture, the dust and grime over once spotless surfaces, the crumbling plaster - in fresh, startling relief.

Narcissa pretended as though her home was as grand and beautiful as the day she moved in, but could not block out the girl's whisper of "What happened here?"

Lucius' shoulders stiffened, and Narcissa reached over and touched his forearm, hoping to calm him before he faced their errant child. They reached the back entrance and descended the stairs into the garden proper, where a table had been set up with a light lunch.

Narcissa had spent the morning doing preparations to make it look as though a house-elf had done everything. Cut flowers formed a centerpiece around china emblazoned with the Malfoy crest - the only thing that had saved them from the Ministry's greedy hands. Narcissa knew from learning about her own family's china that it was intentional, simply so no one could filch a piece or have a financially burdened descendant sell it out of desperation. She felt a stab of shame every time she realized she had become the scorned descendant who would sell her history for money.

"This is lovely!" said the girl, looking around with a rapt expression. "Your garden is beautiful, Mrs. Malfoy. However do you keep it up?"

"It's a hobby of mine," Narcissa replied wryly. "And do call me Narcissa – I'm not the only Mrs. Malfoy present, after all, and I wouldn't want things to become confusing."

The girl smiled weakly and said, "Thank you, Narcissa."

As they began their meal, Narcissa noticed how terrified her new daughter-in-law seemed of Lucius, in particular. Every time he made a motion, she gave a little start. Lucius became increasingly annoyed, until he finally set down his fork and announced, "I have no plans to harm you, girl."

"W-what?" she said, eyes darting rodent-like. "I didn't think you were going to--"

"Then why have you been so jumpy?" Narcissa asked, delicately biting into her sandwich.

"I haven't!" the girl protested. Silence greeted her proclamation. "Well, you'd be nervous, too, if you were dining with people who tried to murder you!"

"I don't recall ever trying to _murder_ you," Lucius said glibly.

"I can't do this," the girl announced. She stood, and glared at Draco. "I tried to be courteous to these monsters, but I just can't. I'm leaving."

"Gin!" Draco said, reaching out to take her arm. She shook her head as she pulled her arm away, and Apparated out with a faint _pop_.

Draco looked at them, obviously dying to chase his bride and sooth her mangled feelings.

"Draco, if you leave me like this, don't bother to return," Narcissa said. "You know perfectly well nothing out of line has been said. The girl is weak."

"Ginny is not weak!" Draco said. "She's the strongest person I know."

The way he was looking at them made it obvious who he was comparing his wife to.

"Don't insult your mother like that," Lucius said. "It hurts her to see you wasted on that sort, after everything we'd done for you."

"You aren't on top of the world anymore," Draco snapped. "Look at you! The house is in ruins, and yet you still act as though I'm the one who's fucking everything up. Why can't you just change with the times?"

"Because I have more respect for our ancestors, the ones who forged this life for us, than that," Lucius replied. "Those people don't understand."

"You act as though I'm surrounded by Muggleborns! I know just as many purebloods and none of them are as stuck in the past as you are," Draco replied. "Ginny's as pure as any of us, and yet you treated her like rubbish!"

"She was acting like a cornered rabbit!" Narcissa said. "Draco, do try to understand that we aren't trying to be the enemy. We're just doing what's right."

"But you aren't right! The war is over, and you lost!"

"We lost, Draco," Lucius said. "You only changed sides when you knew there was no hope."

"And you should have too! Then you wouldn't be living like this!"

"I know it's easy to save your own skin at the expense of your principles," Narcissa said. "We've done it too. But sometimes, Draco, sometimes things are worth fighting for."

"Prejudices and moldering stories are worth fighting for?" Draco asked, giving them a disbelieving look.

"Our way of life, our past and our future were worth fighting for," Narcissa said. "The freedom of knowledge, the freedom to choose our own paths in this world are worth fighting for. Look around you, Draco. Really look at what you see out there. Is burning books that contain what some believe to be evil magic really how things are supposed to be? Is destroying history really the way to restore the future?"

He shook his head slightly, in an unfocused manner. "I can't believe you're still clinging to that old rhetoric."

"They've painted over our family portraits, Draco," Lucius said. "The knowledge my mother and father had to impart on me is gone forever. The knowledge that generations upon generations of Blacks and Malfoys had to share has been erased. Is that the sort of world you want to live in?"

"I have to go," Draco said. He looked sadly between them. "It hurts me to see you like this."

"Think about what we've said," Narcissa said. "And look at what they're doing to our world."

"Goodbye," her son replied, giving them a tight, uncomfortable smile before Apparating away.

* * *

She cancelled her subscription to the newspaper, deeming it a waste of hard-earned money.

They were determined to erase the memory of the Death Eaters, of the pureblood aristocracy, of the Wars from everyone's mind. The news spoke of nothing but the most recent of events, and everything else - all the history so fresh in everyone's minds - fell to the wayside.

Lucius spent his days in his study, writing down his life's story, the things he remembered and the knowledge he had gained. All of it was information deemed classified by the Ministry- deemed inappropriate and unnecessary for the general populace to know.

Dark magic had no place in a peaceful society. Tales of war and injustice had no place. Anything not adhering to the official version of events was treason.

Narcissa knew that Lucius' work would be burned when he died, when she died, when they died and their bodies were discovered decaying within the halls of their rotting mansion.

They had no place in the world they had fought so hard for. They were obsolete, and the new order had no interest in history.

That was their folly, Narcissa knew. Those who failed to learn from history were doomed to repeat it, and all the books that included dark magic could not be burned. Even if they removed every bit of dark knowledge from the British Isles, the rest of the world would not follow suit.

Narcissa was content to roam the halls of her home and occasionally tell Lucius the stories of her past to include in his work. She had a fanciful idea that Draco would like to read it one day, when his head wasn't quite so full of ideals and optimism, and wanted him to know all of his history.

History was what was important in this world. It was her legacy, her family's legacy and all that she could do to achieve immortality. Her father's quiet insistence that keeping family traditions was the sole path to immortality had been true; more true than he had probably ever imagined.

Staring at the world past the end of her era, Narcissa Malfoy understood what made legends important. Legends were what kept the still-living ghosts pacified until they could die. Legends were the parts of history that gave hope. Legends proved that their struggles were not futile, even if they did not live to see the resolution.

Narcissa was resigned to become part of a history written by the righteous victors. Narcissa's dreams and aspirations were the villainous thoughts of an evil, deranged woman. Narcissa was nothing more than a footnote in the course of an empire.


End file.
